"Surely, the Syrian and all other similar civil conflicts that go out of control are problems the UNITED NATIONS should be called upon to bring to and end, not individual nations. I was under the impression that was the "raison d`etre" of the U.N." - John from Kemsing

The only means the UNITED NATIONS has at its beck and call to bring anything to an end is the verbosity of its members representatives. The United Nations is a talking shop, nothing more, nothing less.

So far they can talk about it all they like, the veto power of Russia and China blocks any good that the UN might have been able to do, not surprising that really as both of those states do not want to set uncomfortable precedents as they may wish to attack sections of their own populations before too long - (Sorry what was that you said? - Oh yes, Chechnya, Dagestan and Tibet I had forgotten all about them).